


unclose me

by HeayPuckett



Series: The Adventures of Molly Hooper and the Holmes Brothers [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Drunk!Sherlock, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Molly should be careful what she wishes for, Poetry, Possibly Unrequited Love, Romance, Sherlock shouldn't talk to Molly under the influence, drunk!John, drunk!Poetry, pre-sherlolly, the stag do got out of hand, vaguely implied future sherlolly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-23
Updated: 2014-03-03
Packaged: 2018-01-13 13:48:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1228720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeayPuckett/pseuds/HeayPuckett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set between Chapters Five and Six of Mycroft, at the Diogenes Club with Tea. </p><p>Chapter One:<br/>On their way back to Baker Street during stag night,  John and Sherlock get into a row. They take a detour to St. Bart's so that Molly Hooper can settle the argument. (Actually, John wants Sherlock to apologize and Molly is the only one he's ever seen accomplish this.)</p><p>Chapter Two:<br/>Molly was just minding her own business when she was suddenly confronted by a heavily medicated Sherlock fresh from his hospital break out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is me jumping in on the Drunk!Sherlock fandom. Sorry. Set during The Sign of Three, between "I know ash!" and the two asleep on the stairs to 221B. The poem is "somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond" by e.e. cummings. I know I can't be the only one who thinks this poem fits Sherlock/Molly perfectly. A huge THANK YOU (!) to Stormweaver who beta read the various drafts for me.

 

* * *

 

The night shift at St. Bartholomew's hospital was about as quiet as any night shift can be in a city like London. That is to say, not really that quiet at all. Molly Hooper had finally found a few moments to finish a paper for the Journal of Pathology when the sounds of an apocalypse rang out from the hallway. Ah, Sherlock had arrived. 

It was the night before John Watson's wedding and, having personal knowledge of Sherlock's plans for the stag do, Molly had been expecting a visit at some point. According to the very detailed schedule, barring unforeseen circumstances, the duo would be finished touring pubs/murder sites by 9, leaving plenty of time to collect some research samples before heading home.  Apparently, unforeseen circumstances had occurred. 

Molly was only a few steps outside the doors of the morgue when one of her favourite secret fantasies came to life: two men fell at her feet. Of course they were quite drunk, pitifully dishevelled and currently bickering like two old grannies.

"You- you, _you_ ," John Watson stuttered, each word punctuated with a little burp, "you apoly-, apo," he reached over and batted towards Sherlock's curly head, "You! Say you're sorry!"

"No!" Sherlock shouted into the floor. 

"What is going on here?" Molly interrupted, feeling more annoyed than she really should. Hadn't she suspected something would go wrong? 

Sherlock sat up violently at the sound of Molly's voice and pointed an unsteady finger in her general direction. Obviously he couldn't decide which Molly of the two he was seeing was the real Molly, so the drunken genius just alternated between them both. "This is your fault, Holly Mooper!"

"How do you figure that?" Molly asked, crossing her arms. She didn't know whether to smile at how adorable the two men looked sprawled in the middle of the floor or call security and have them tossed into a bin.

 "You," Sherlock pointed to Molly-on-the-left, then turned to Molly-on-the-right, "and you... messed up the calucations... calculations." 

"Been urinating in wardrobes then?" Molly asked with a straight face, "I did say that you should take in to account John trying to sneak extra drinks here and there."

Sherlock looked outraged for a moment then focused on his swaying companion. John giggled and leaned against the wall, completely unrepentant. Sherlock managed to leverage himself into a semi-seated position and land a kick to John-on-the-left's leg. John growled and retaliated (missing completely), thus beginning the most pitiful slap-fight ever seen outside a nursery.  

A highly amused Molly watched this for several moments (and it's a testament to her kind heart that it didn't even occur to her to record any of it), before deciding to intervene.  

"That's enough!" she shouted, giving each man a little kick. When she kicked at Sherlock he grabbed her foot and wouldn't let go. Molly tried unsuccessfully to tug her foot free, then gave up. Considering the fact that the two were being quiet, she decided balancing on one foot for a few minutes was not inconvenient enough to start another fight. 

"You are acting like children," Molly said, giving her foot another wiggle, to no effect, "Sherlock, I need that foot." 

"You can have it back when I'm finished." 

That was a conversation the two had often, but the foot in question was generally in a biohazard container, not still attached to someone breathing. Molly sighed, again deciding to pick her battles and asked, "Okay, one of you tell me what you're doing here." 

That was the wrong question. John immediately remembered his earlier outrage, but evidently not the cause. Sherlock was petulant as always, but with a more limited vocabulary to express himself. They talked over each other until Sherlock's vocabulary momentarily left him entirely and John jumped into the breach. 

" _He_ ," John declared, pointing at a scowling Sherlock, "has to apo-, poly-, say he's sorry!" 

"No I don't!"  

"Yes you do!"

"Why?" Molly cut in, grabbing the wall to steady herself when Sherlock inadvertently tugged her foot again. She turned to John, calling his name twice before she got the older man's attention. "What did Sherlock do?" 

"He- ohhh," John sputtered in anger. It would have been intimidating if not for the fact that he couldn't seem to move without listing to the left. "He was ruuude, Molly, he said- he said, I don't remember what he said, but Molly, it was rude. Make him apoly-" 

"No!" Sherlock shouted. That time, Molly was forced to steady herself by clutching at Sherlock's head.  

"Ow. That's my hair. Let go." 

"Let go of my foot."  

"No." 

Molly  turned back to John. "You came all the way down to Bart's so I could tell Sherlock to apologize." 

"Yup." 

"I don't apologize! You can't make me! She can't make me," Sherlock sneered.

"Yes she can," John said will confidence, "She's done it before."

Sherlock brandished Molly's foot, making her hop a little so as not to end up sprawled in the floor with the other two, "Look at this," he continued, shaking her foot, "Look at this little foot. You expect me to listen to someone with such a tiny foot? HA!" 

"Sherlock, please apologize to John." 

"Sorry John- damn." 

John cackled. 

"How do you do that?!" Sherlock shouted. Molly finally lost her heroic battle to remain standing. Her other foot slid too far and she overcompensated by clutching at Sherlock's head. He screamed when she accidentally pulled his hair and he reared back. Molly ended up in a completely undignified heap, half in Sherlock's lap and half in John's. On the plus side, she had her foot back. 

Molly wrestled herself into a sitting position, not sparing a shred of sympathy for the two drunks as her knees and elbows connected with all manner of soft bits of their anatomies. She was pushing her way back into a standing position, when Sherlock caught her around the waist.  

"No really. HOW do you do that? You're so tiny! How can you do that to people? Tiny feet, tiny sharp elbows-" 

"Tiny lips, tiny breasts," Molly mumbled, pushing Sherlock away, "I get the idea."  

She managed to disentangle herself and moved to stand. Sherlock caught her wrist and stared at her silently. Molly froze. She was not used to being the object of such intense focus, not even from Sherlock, especially not from Sherlock.  

"Somewhere I have never traveled, gladly beyond any experience, your eyes have their silence," Sherlock said quietly. It was said with such gravity that it startled poor Molly terribly. 

"Wh-what?" She stuttered. Her eyes were wide and wary.  

 "...in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me," Sherlock continued, his voice low and steady, "or which I cannot touch because they are too near." 

"Is that...? Are you quoting poetry?" 

"Your slightest look easily will unclose me though I have closed myself as fingers, you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens -touching skilfully, mysteriously- her first rose,"  

Sherlock pulled Molly's hand closer and, one by one, uncurled her fingers from the fist she had made. Long fingers brushed over her open palm in featherlight strokes. Sherlock looked up at Molly with something close to... well, she couldn't identify it, but it made her shiver.

"Or if your wish be to close me, I and my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly, as when the heart of this flower imagines the snow carefully everywhere descending." 

Sherlock cradled her hand between his. Molly's vision blurred with tears she refused to let fall.  

"Nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals the power of your intense fragility: whose texture compels me with the color of its countries, rendering death and forever with each breathing."

One large, elegant hand moved up Molly's arm, tracing the pattern of colors in the wool of her jumper and then back.  Sherlock covered her hand with his and pressed their palms together.  

"I do not know what it is about you that closes and opens; only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses; nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands..." 

Sherlock looked up and Molly lost the battle to keep her tears at bay. She inhaled roughly but stopped breathing completely when Sherlock smiled, one of the small, genuine smiles few were privileged to see. The breath she held exploded in a whimpering chuckle as Sherlock Holmes promptly passed out in her lap.  

Molly took a little time to collect herself, so it was a few moments before she realized they had an audience. Thankfully, it consisted only of Edgar, one of the senior hospital security personnel, and her boss, Mike Stamford. Molly smiled and (discreetly, she hoped) dashed away the wetness on her cheek.  

"I could use a little help getting these two home."  

Mike got a passing intern to go fetch a cab and then took charge of John. Molly wasn't sure when he had passed out, but it was long enough for a pool of drool to form on the floor by his head. It took Edgar and Molly both to wrangle Sherlock to the cab, not because he was being difficult, but because he had become a lanky, boneless mass while unconscious. 

While the two older men were making sure Sherlock and John stayed put, Molly gave the cabbie the address and payment for their trip. When she tried to give him a bit more to make sure they made it safely inside 221B Baker Street, he waived it away.  

"You keep that, miss," the cabbie said with a friendly pat to her hand, "I'll see that they get in, don't you worry."  

"Thank you," Molly said with a watery smile, "you're very kind."  

As she stepped back from the cab, Molly heard: 

"You see that? She did it again!" 

"How does she  _do_  that?"

"Doe eyes of dooooom." 

Molly stood watching the cab disappear into the night and indulged in a bit of wallowing. This wasn't the worst experience she had had with Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. It didn't even rate in the top twenty on that list. Yet, somehow, Molly felt more emotionally battered. It was bad enough that she allowed herself to be mesmerized by the inconceivable sound of Sherlock reciting poetry. Even worse, he probably wouldn't remember any of it the following morning. There were times when Molly wished she never met Sherlock Holmes. Then there were times when she couldn't imagine her life without Sherlock. Oddly enough, today was both.  

Taking a deep breath and squaring her shoulders, Molly Hooper got back to work. 


	2. Unconditional

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly was just minding her own business when she was suddenly confronted by a heavily medicated Sherlock fresh from his hospital break-out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: I really, really intended "unclose me" to be a one-off, but then this idea popped into my head. It just seemed to fit here better than being on its own. Set during HLV, between Sherlock's first stay in hospital and his call to John.

* * *

 

 

"Why are you still here?"

Molly Hooper screamed and spun around to find Sherlock Holmes standing three feet away. How he always managed to sneak up on her in the deathly quiet (no pun intended) morgue, would forever puzzle Molly. At least she hadn't thrown the bone saw at him this time.

"Sherlock?" Molly gasped with rising alarm. "What are you doing out of the hospital?"

"I was released," Sherlock said with a shrug. The red rings around his eyes, pale skin and beads of sweat on his upper lip contradicted his assertion.

"You were shot a week ago, Sherlock. I don't care how well you are healing, there is no way you were released from hospital."

Sherlock rolled his eyes, " _Fine_. I left. Not important."

Molly made of noise of protest, but Sherlock didn't give her the chance to speak. He took a surprisingly forceful step forward and demanded, "Why are you still here?"

"I work here, Sherlock," Molly said patiently as she reached out for him, "and I prefer you not ending up as my next case, so let's-"

"No!" Sherlock shouted. Molly took a startled step back. Sherlock saw this and, with effort, calmed himself. "No,  _why_  are you still here? Why haven't you told me to piss off yet? Most people do with a lot less reason than I've given you over the years."

"I'm not most people. Obviously." Molly studied the tall man carefully. He was clearly in pain, but ambulatory, so there was probably still a high amount of morphine in his system. Eight days confined to bed had left Sherlock weak. Molly was mentally calculating her chances of physically forcing Sherlock upstairs to be examined when he spoke again.

"No, you aren't most people. You're Molly. You're a skilled pathologist and lab technician. You have no family -unless one counts the cat, which I know you do- and you are popular among the staff here. I know your favourite brand of coffee, which movies you like the most and how often you have to pick up groceries in a week. I know every minute detail about you Molly Hooper, and yet, I still don't really know you, do I?"

Molly didn't really know what to say to that. She wanted to say that Sherlock knew her as well as she knew him, but that wasn't true. He could deduce facts, but feelings were something different and that was where he invariably went wrong. He was correct. On that level, he didn't really know her that well.

"Why are you still here?" Sherlock asked again, his eyes narrowed in that way that indicated he wasn't letting this puzzle go until it was solved.

"Because you need me," Molly said simply, "even if you don't want me."

It took every ounce of courage Molly Hooper possessed to tell that particular truth. She had asked herself the same question over the years: Why? Why did she fight so hard to remain in Sherlock's orbit? It took all of the two years he was "dead" to figure it out and, when she did, it turned out to be quite simple. For Molly, being needed was almost as good as being wanted. It was also much more difficult.

Sherlock's eyes widened when she made the statement, but only for an instant. He scowled and opened his mouth to say something. Molly didn't trust him not to verbally gouge out her heart on a good day and she certainly wasn't going to risk it when he was still feeling the morphine.

"That's all there is to it, Sherlock," She interrupted. "I'm sorry it's not more complicated. I know how you like to be clever, but there's nothing to figure out this time. It's really that simple."

Sherlock swallowed and took a deep breath. His intense gaze had not left Molly once since she had startled her with is first question. Molly watched as the hard lines on his forehead and the sharp creases around his eyes softened. His lips twitched into a brief smile.

"Want and need overlap more than people think," he mumbled. With effort, he stood up straighter and looked down his nose at Molly, a posture with which she was very familiar. "I've been horrible to you."

"Yes," Molly said, "but, to be fair, I don't always let you get away with it."

His lips twitched as he rubbed at his jaw, "No, you don't." He still sounded disgruntled about being slapped, but, as Molly said, she wasn't going to let him get away with certain things.

"You deserved that," she said, raising her chin, "I would have slapped you a couple of more times, but I sprained my wrist with that last one."

"At least you didn't cut yourself," Sherlock mumbled.

"There's a story behind that comment, isn't there?" Molly asked, amused.

"Yes, but no time to tell it."

"So...you're eventually going to tell me?"

"Probably not," Sherlock conceded, "I need my phone."

"Oh, right," Molly pulled Sherlock's mobile from her trouser pocket and handed it over, relieved that he had a genuine reason for seeking her out and it wasn't just the morphine. "I don't know why you had me take it. Couldn't John or Ma-"

"No," Sherlock interrupted quickly, already distracted by the text messages he was composing, "not this time."

While Sherlock was busy sending several rapid-fire texts, Molly cautiously stepped forward, reaching for Sherlock's arm, "This has been interesting, but you need to be under care."

Sherlock stepped away, holding his mobile away as though Molly was going to snatch it and said, "I'm fine. I have too much to do." He glared and continued, "And don't you try to bully me, Molly Hooper, or I really will be horrible."

Molly gave it up as a bad job and sighed, "I suppose there's no use telling you to mind yourself? No? Didn't think so. At least let me call John."

"Already planning on it myself." He turned to leave, stopped and turned back. "I really am sorry about your engagement," he said quietly, fatigue evident in his voice. Molly just smiled. "There's a story there," Sherlock said with a grin.

"Yes."

"...but you're not going to tell me."

"Probably not," Molly confirmed.

Molly watched Sherlock leave, even following him to the door so that she could watch him walk down the hallway. She had to fight the urge to call security and have him strapped to a gurney. In the end, she knew he would just find another way to escape and probably do more damage to himself in the process. She believed him when he said he was going to call John. At least he would have a doctor with him during whatever scheme he was setting up.

Once Sherlock had disappeared through the double doors at the end of the corridor, Molly went back to the office and sat down. She had a full schedule and it was turning out to be a busy evening, but she needed a quiet moment to contemplate what just happened.

Molly's father had once told her that the people who needed unconditional love the most were the ones who were least deserving. She had long ago accepted that her feelings for Sherlock were not going to go away. Ever. Her goal nowadays was to come to terms with the fact that she loved a man as complex and, yes, potentially cruel as the consulting detective. If she could do that, if Molly could accept her role in his life, she knew she could do anything Sherlock ever asked of her.

 

* * *

 


End file.
